The biggest challenges for Norwegian women are the usual suspects: sexual violence, lower wages and less power than men. And yet the biggest advance for Norwegian women this year was about giving more money to men.

In April 2011 the government announced that the paid maternity leave period reserved for dads was to be increased from 10 to 12 weeks. The maternity leave in Norway is long: 10 months on full wages, or a year on 80%. Women usually take most of this, but over the last 20 years, as the state has slowly increased the leave, it has reserved a bigger and bigger part of it for men. The statistics show that fathers take their allocation, but seldom more. Some might say this is because men don't like to be with their children, but it's probably more because women are still expected to stay at home with their children while men are not. The "dad leave" is about changing the expectations for men and their employers.

In January this year, Statistic Norway released their survey about how Norwegians use their time. This survey has been performed every 10 years since the early 70s. The last survey showed that we use less and less time on household work, while the amount of time used on care (playing with children, helping relatives etc) is the same as in the early 70s. Women making their way in the world of work has not made Norway a colder society, just a little more dusty and dirty. And an important reason for this is that fathers have more than doubled the time they spend with their children over the last 40 years.

Of course, a designated dad's leave shouldn't be necessary. In an ideal world, every family should be left to decide for themselves how much they each want to use of the maternity leave. But just as women's quotas at boardroom level are necessary to make boards consider their female worker's competence, dad's leave might be necessary to give the men a chance to show what they're good for. If women are to get the chance to share the power and money in work life, it's equally necessary that the work (and fun) at home is more equally shared.